The Aesthetics Advisor

One of the most promising approaches in cellular therapies is immunotherapies using engineered T cells or natural killer (NK) cells expressing chimeric antigen receptors (CARs). Will CAR-NK cell therapies overshadow traditional CAR-T options for the treatment of some cancers?   Recently researchers have tried to modify natural killer (NK) cells with chimeric antigen receptors (CAR) to increase potential to bind and destroy cancer cells, known as NK cell therapy. Here we describe the differences between CAR T cell therapies and CAR NK cell therapies to consider when developing cancer treatments for patients. What is CAR-T? T cells are part of the adaptive immune system and are intended to generate a long lasting protective immune response. By engineering T cells with the Natural Killer Group 2D (NKG2D) receptor, they become NKG2D CAR T cell therapies. What is CAR-NK?  NK cells are a part of the innate immune system and are the first line of defense against foreign infections a...

CANCER remains to be one of the top three killer diseases in the country, next only to ischemic and cerebrovascular diseases. The difficult part for most cancers is that some are detected when it is at its more serious stage already, where treatment and recovery would be next to impossible for certain patients. However, the future of early cancer detection in the Philippines remains to be bright through a new technology that will soon be available in the country to help fight cancer called Next Generation Sequencing (NGS). Cancer defined ACCORDING to Dr. Eugene Odoño, Medical Specialist III at the Department of Laboratories of the UP Philippine General Hospital (UP-PGH), cancer is defined as the abnormal growth of cells that may lead to the formation of tumors. While the existence of a tumor does not necessarily mean it is cancer, most cancers, except those in the blood, can create tumors. Cancer may also deprive the body of nutrition and can also destroy other organs a...

A 2022 study published in The New England Journal of Medicine has yielded groundbreaking results after a monoclonal antibody successfully eradicated rectal cancer in all enrolled patients, ushering them into complete remission without resorting to chemotherapy, radiation, or surgical interventions. Dr. Andrea Cercek, one of the lead researchers, said, “It’s absolutely incredible. We didn’t expect it.  We’ve certainly never seen this before . It’s really what, you know, cancer doctors’ dreams are made of to see a response like this. Such incredible efficacy with really, almost no toxicity.” Twelve patients participated, with a median age of 54 and 62% being women. These individuals had advanced rectal cancer, which typically requires harsh treatments. Patients were administered dostarlimab, a specific type of monoclonal antibody, every three weeks for six months, avoiding the conventional, often debilitating treatments associated with their condition. Every participant experienced...

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved the first immunotherapy drug for the treatment of nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC), a type of head and neck cancer. The approval of  toripalimab (Loqtorzi) , announced on October 27, was based on results of two  clinical trials  conducted in Asia, where NPC is much more common than in most other parts of the world. Both trials were sponsored by Shanghai Junshi Biosciences, which developed the drug. FDA’s approval of the drug — the first approval of toripalimab in the United States — covers its use as an initial treatment for people  with NPC that has come back (recurred) or spread to other parts of the body (metastatic). The approval also includes using toripalimab  on its own for people with recurrent or metastatic NPC that has gotten worse on or after standard chemotherapy. The approval should immediately change the way that people with NPC are treated in this country, said Barbara Burtness, M.D., a head and ne...

In 2015, Alka Dwivedi, then a graduate student at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Bombay, began wondering whether a CAR T-cell therapy could be made in India. At the time, several CAR T-cell therapies—a type of immunotherapy in which a person’s T cells are modified in a laboratory to selectively kill cancer cells—were being tested in clinical trials in the United States. And although CAR T-cell therapies looked to be promising treatments for blood cancers like leukemia and lymphoma, they could have serious side effects and were expected to carry a high price tag once approved for use. Both issues, she felt, meant that these cutting-edge treatments—at least in the form in which they were being produced at the time—wouldn’t be a viable option for many people in low- and middle-income countries like India. Dr. Dwivedi and her colleagues envisioned designing a different CAR T-cell therapy, one that could be produced in, and meet the needs of, people with cancer in their country. B...